A nurse has been killed and another health worker seriously injured in an attack on a team responding to an Ebola alert in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. The attack took place on 24 October in Bafwasende, Tshopo province, and was reported by the World Health Organization the following day.
Local authorities had not announced details about the attackers at publication. WHO leaders condemned the violence and called for protection of people working to contain the outbreak.
Staff safety is part of the health response itself. Contact tracing, testing, care and safe burials require specialists to reach communities and work with them.
Fear and mistrust can make that difficult even before a physical threat emerges. An attack on a response team adds risk to subsequent visits: a delayed investigation of an alert can leave infections undetected for longer.
Ebola control combines clinical care, surveillance, laboratory confirmation, contact tracing and community involvement. Protecting health workers allows those activities to continue. The archive photograph accompanying this report shows protective-equipment training, rather than the attack in Congo.
